McCain and Obama Fail to Acknowledge Their Responsibility for the Current Economic Crisis

Both these guys are senators and have been looking the other way as private interests have used and abused the taxpayer. Bloomberg reports both are promising to clean up Wall Street:

The last eight years ``have brought us to the most serious financial crisis since the Great Depression,'' said Obama, the Democratic nominee, in a statement that also called for ``modernizing'' the rules governing financial institutions.

``We will never put America in this position again,'' McCain, the Republican nominee, told supporters in Jacksonville, Florida. He vowed to ``clean up Wall Street'' and ``replace the outdated, patchwork quilt of regulatory oversight.''

The reality is that the government allows business to write its legislation and profits flow to private interests while risk goes to the taxpayer. Its the same old story over and over again.

Congress does not pursue the interests; it pursues the interests of whoever is giving them campaign contributions.

We simply must reform our electoral system so that all the voters have their interests represented. If we don't take action, expect more of the same stupidity.

Killed by text message

Distractions caused by text messaging can be dangerous, as evidenced by this Google search.

What can be done about this, especially for charged with driving trains or buses? Does it make sense to give such operators special cell phones that cannot text or make calls (except to others working for the same transportation agency or 911) while in motion?

The Truth About Mass Transit

thetruthaboutcars.com has a post that uses this photo from China.

The ironic thing is that it shows you some truth about buses too, as the gridlock depicted is clearly caused by buses blocking exits from the traffic circle. Where there are no buses, there's traffic flow. The buses form bigger barriers on traffic circles.

The solution to this particular problem is not getting rid of buses, of course. Its installing signals to stop traffic from coming on to the circle when things get blocked.

I like traffic circles, but there a bit tough for pedestrians, especially handicapped people, to navigate. Signals can help there too, of course. The so-called modern roundabout has this and other features. Wikipedia has an interesting article about them.

Biden His Time

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McClellan Blasts W

Scott McClellan reveals in his new book how screwy the Bush Whitehouse is and how they deceived the country about the Iraq War.

Stay tuned, especially if the Democrats get in. People will be coming out of the woodwork talking about all the arm twisting, data dumping and fabrication committed during this shameful period.

'Sicko': Heavily Doctored, By Kurt Loder - Movie News Story | MTV Movie News

Kurt Loder reviews 'Sicko' and exposes some of the distortions Michael Moore presents as fact. The massive waiting lists for care in Canada and the UK are good to keep in mind when comparing the US system with others.

You can watch Milton Friedman's Free to Choose series online

Friedman is one of the good guys to be sure. I don't agree with everything he says, but most of it is excellent. Check it out!

Iraq War Leadership Needs Shuffling

Bush is replacing all of the worn out blood charged with executing his Iraq war policy. The failures do dictate a change. But the change needs to be made a little higher up. A quick resignation by Bush and Cheney would work better.

Of course, that would leave Nancy Pelosi in the White House. As bad as Bush and Cheney are, I don't think she is up to the job.

The Left Finally Takes a Stand on Freedom of Speech

Turns out they are against it.


I guess the whole idea of having a border is politically incorrect now, as is the notion that you even have the right to lock your own front door to whoever happens to want to enter.

Have we learned nothing from the past? Wasn't the lack of a defensible border what caused the previous owners of America to lose control? Ok, just kidding there, but really, now, a border is a must have and controlling who crosses it is just part of your right to exist on a piece of land unmolested by others. Previous crimes of this nature notwithstanding.

All that aside, a stronger border is not the solution. Getting rid of the distortions in our labor markets will decrease the cost of US labor and removing the citizenship-by-birth carrot will decrease immigrant willingness to put up with low wages.

But, even if we do nothing about this issue, is the situation all that bad? Getting across the border is dangerous to be sure, but otherwise I think everybody benefits. Even those that are getting more competition benefit, as we all do from competition.

White House visitor records closed

Who says the Bush League can't solve a problem? Too many embarassing visitors at the White House? Problem solved! Hide the records!

Recent Chat About Electoral Reform

dude: what would you do to change the world?
Al Brown: i would reform the US's electoral system
Al Brown: switch to proportional representation and instant runoff voting
Al Brown: implement sensible voting machines
Al Brown: that would fix a lot of problems in the world right there
dude: really?
dude: you think that'd get people to vote?
dude: or just give senior citizens more power?
dude: haha
Al Brown: i'd let people select a party to represent them and then keep it for as long as they like or change it as often as the like - rebalance the legislative branch in real time
Al Brown: that way people would not have to vote periodically
dude: would you still keep it a dual party?
Al Brown: but would still get their interests represented
Al Brown: proportional representation would do away two dominate parties
Al Brown: each party would get seats in the legislature
Al Brown: i would also just let the legislature pick the president
dude: so, like the British
Al Brown: that alone would save hundreds of millions of dollars and a lot of agony
Al Brown: sort of like the parliamentary system, but Britain doesn't use proportional representation
Al Brown: so they have two dominate parties
Al Brown: dominant
dude: true, but still have other parties right?
dude: the most we have is maybe a third...
Al Brown: the smaller parties can't get seats because each voting area is winner-take-all
Al Brown: which stops smaller parties
Al Brown: its very anti-democratic
dude: so how do you think your plan would play out?
Al Brown: we are winner-take-all too, so smaller parties never get their share of power in the legislature
Al Brown: well, its not my original idea
dude: yeah
dude: still
Al Brown: but it would result in decisions that better represent our collective interests rather than the interests of the corporationsd
Al Brown: winner-take-all system makes misrepresentation of a candidates views pay off
Al Brown: and then pays off the candidate to vote the way the contributors want
Al Brown: countries that have PR have less expensive campaigns
Al Brown: and a party's candidates are more likely to stick with the party's constituents
Al Brown: since they don't have to vote for a compromise like we do
dude: ic
Al Brown: its like anything else. u hire a guy to represent u in court. he is your guy. he does what u say
Al Brown: isn't that how it should be?
dude: I guess
Al Brown: the legislators still have to trade support for different things to get things done, but that actually results in everyone getting more of what they want when the process is honest
Al Brown: I really care about getting X and you don't care about it either way, well, you will help me on this if I help u in a similar situation, so we both get more of what we care about

Google Patents

Now you use Google to search patents. Just be aware that when are using Google to search, Google is searching you. If you are a person of significance to Google (i.e. an actual productive inventor or investor in inventions), what you are up to is pretty clear to Google.

GOP pays $135K for New Hampshire call jamming

The Associated Press is reporting that the Republicans have agreed to $135 for jamming Democratic phones lines during the last election.

Google has more on Republican efforts to win elections this way. Karl Rove's influence has been pretty strong on the entire party it seems.

Sanity Wins One

The NY TImes reports that rabid anti-peace forces in Pagosa Springs have given up their fight against a collection of fir tree branches hung in front of a house there.

Its unclear if the fir tree branches had tried to interfere with any military operations.

Two-year-old Emirati boy held as airport threat

Bureacracy runs amok again with mindless watch lists.

You have to wonder: if this is how incompetantly governments deal with their citizens, how effectively can they deal with an actual terror threat?

Incidents like this happen every day in US airports. People, who happen to share the same name as someone on the list legitimately, are detained for hours even if they are of a different age, height and race than their namesake.

And this has been the state of affairs for FIVE YEARS! That is what your three trillion dollars is buying for you.

It's Time for a Change

It's time for a change in Washington. Hopefully, this election will restore some balance to the branches of government. Congress has been Bush's pet for too long.

Oh sure, the Republicans are howling about Bush's failures in Iraq now. But won't they go right back to supporting those same policies right after the election? We need an opposition in Congress now more than ever.

It's time for Bush to learn to play well with others.

It's time to pass an amendment to the Constitution that makes a president's immediate family ineligible to become president.

And, no, it is not time for Nancy Pelosi's agenda. The Democrats would be wise to focus on exposing Bush, Rove, Rumsfeld and Cheney and save the country from their foreign policy.

It's time for Congress to find out how our money is being spent in Iraq. Who is siphoning off those billions and to which numbered Swiss accounts?

Former SKorean leader faults Bush on North Korea Nuke Test

Apparently some in South Korea think Bush's policies contributed to their pursuit of nuclear weapons.

How can that be? Just because Bush placed them in the jingoistic Axis of Evil, invaded one "member" of the Axis and surrounded another, doesn't mean North Korea should feel any need to get weapons that cause Bush to think about twice.

And Bush's actions aren't motivating Iran's nuclear efforts either. Uh huh.

John McQuaid Makes some Excellent Points

This fellow makes the point that politicians don't seem to care about whether they do a good job or not. I guess that's true, especially if you are in Congress and its highly unlikely you'll be turned out in the next election.

I think its about time we stopped letting these people abuse the rest of us. Term limits, proportional representation and instant runoff voting are the cure.

A great thing to add to the US constitution

Richard Cohen makes a good case for adding an amendment to the US constitution that wold prohibit children of presidents from running for the office themselves. "Now is the time for yet another amendment. This one would ensure that no child of a president could become president."

Cohen explains that Bush's reasons for invading Iraq are somewhat colored by his father's experience with the country. Given the magnitude of the decisions made by the chief executive of any government, its probably a good idea to keep family stuff out of the decision making process.